Building Nurse Upstanders for Health Equity

Health inequities are prevalent in the United States and globally; however, racism as a root cause for health inequities is not explicitly addressed in most nursing or health science curricula.

Nursing students enrolled in an undergraduate Bachelor of Science in Nursing research course were immersed in a trip to a Holocaust and Human Rights Museum as a nontraditional experiential approach to building upstanders for health equity.

Students used their experiences to inspire research to advocate for health equity for vulnerable populations and disseminated their research at local, national, and international conferences.

Nurse educators are responsible for ensuring nursing curricula are current and inclusive to address the health needs of patients and communities and to improve patient and population health outcomes. Embedding an immersive experience and related assignments is one strategy toward dismantling structural racism in health care. [.